"A Man's Gotta Know His Limitations"

If you don't test your limits, you don't know your capacity.

You probably agree that that's a pretty familiar concept. We see it everywhere. 

"Just do it"

"Push yourself".  

"Give me three more".

"Strive to Achieve"

"Per Ardua ad Astram"

Steps may have said it best ... "Reach for the stars"

We are supposed to work hard because...well, why? After all it's hard isn't it? Wouldn't you rather not bother? Isn't easy better than hard?

So we tell ourselves vaguely that working hard achieves things. Working hard is good. It shows dedication and discipline, endeavour, hope and clarity - bla, bla, bla, you know all those things that were popular in the 70s.

And yet nowadays corruption, celebrity and an easy life are equally popular and considerably more fashionable things to aim for.

Nevertheless, despite the world around us contradicting traditional principles, we occasionally choose to remind ourselves that if we reach and push, then we might achieve. At the very least we can learn about our potential. We've got to be able to agree that's a good thing.

I'm sure I've paraphrased such sickly sweet intents here often enough.

But try this.

If you don't test your capacity, you don't know your limits.

Clint Eastwood's Dirty Harry taught a generation too young to watch his movies that "a man's gotta know his limitations".

When my father was dying, he started to exercise for probably the first time in his life. He kept good records so when I saw his records of his achievements on the treadmill - a mile on the jogging/running/actually walking treadmill taking over half an hour, it occurred to me that 2 miles an hour is a limit worth knowing about. 

One you wouldn't know about if you lived within your limits and if you hadn't put your capacity to the test.

In this case it would have revealed a dark story about a hidden health issue.

It's useful information, worth knowing about.